Dumb article in The Times about Benedict XVI

There is a profoundly silly article by John Follain on the Pope in the last Sunday number of The Times.

The writer clearly dislikes this Pope and what he is doing. From that point of view he couldn’t possibly write a real story for a newspaper. Instead he focuses on the rantings of the like-minded Giancarlo Zizola and Marco Politi.

The Pope is accused of being an aloof monarch.

Stupid, if you know Joseph Ratzinger at all.

He does make one good point, which I have offered before on the blog. The Holy Father’s secretary, Fr. Ganswein, is pretty tough about keeping things off the Pope’s desk if they can be avoided.

I would only add that there is also a group of mid to upper level curial personnel who are set against this Pope and his vision.

15 Responses to Dumb article in The Times about Benedict XVI

Basic question from a (current) Protestant — if there is “a group of mid to upper level curial personnel who are set against this Pope and his vision,” why does he not fire or otherwise sideline them? He is Head of State in Vatican City, no?

Honest question. I see Catholics talk about papal enemies in the Vatican, and while I know bureaucrats we will have with us always, why not just take charge and, if not roll heads, move heads? How do such things work?

Same problem with every conservative President of the U.S. when he takes office: the bureaucracy, ever liberal, selfish and jealous of “empire”, does everything it can to block *true* progress. G.W. Bush never had a chance. Let us pray that the Holy Father’s vision will prevail.

One of the things to remember is that those same bureaucrats that get moaned about are in many cases the institutional memory of how things are run.

It’s nice to -think- about sacking the enemies of this or that Pope or this or that policy wholesale – but if you did, the Vatican bureaucracy (which already only sort of runs) would come to a screeching halt.

You might celebrate that, but…I assure you, your celebrations would be brief. If you think it’s bad now, watch how the Vatican would run without the core “civil servants” to keep things on track.

It wouldn’t.

So, in short: Sure, a Pope *could* fire their enemies, but they’re not likely to. (Nor would it be the brightest idea!) Besides, in many cases we’re talking about ‘enemies’ only in a narrow, issue-by-issue, sense. On other issues, they may well be fervently loyal.

Finally: In many cases, while you may disagree with Card. Y or Bishop X in Rome…They’re not often at their posts because they’re political hacks. (Not usually, anyway.) In many cases, especially on spiritual matters, the Vatican scoops up the best and brightest in their fields.

This, I will grant, is not uniform. Every bureaucracy has its clunkers. But the Vatican bureaucracy (Father Z, could you confirm my numbers here?) has only about 300 people that work for it – I think that number excludes the diplomatic corps, but could be wrong. 300, in bureaucratic terms, is tiny.

Truly bad actors, actors with truly malevolent aims (not differing, but malevolent) do not long survive in an organization so small.

I read the full article in The Times, and found it a bit depressing. The Pope is over 80 years old. He’s been elected to a position that would tax a man half his age, at an age when probably 99+% of people would wish to spend their remaining years in a happy retirement. He can hardly be blamed for wanting some peace and quiet at times – and his desire for this peace and quiet at meal-times is the reason why he was referred to as an “aloof monarch”. Instead, he’s governing the entire church militant, with an estimated global population of 1.1 billion people. Any decision he makes is immediately criticised by whichever wing (left or right) of the Hcurchwhich is dissatisfied with his comments and decisions – plus all the negative criticism he receives from the secular world, such as the article in The Times.

It would be really nice if we could all get behind the Pope with our prayers at the moment.

1. The Pope is a monarch, and with power. Monarchy with power does not have much purchase on the esteem of most people post, say, 1918, except in Thailand and some more tribal lands.

2. Aloof is convenient but facile. This Pope is a different personality from his predecessor. And, if anything, I believe he has deliberately chosen to accentuate this difference in order to do something very estimable: wean people from the cult of papal charisma that flourished under his predecessor. The traditional Roman way (going back to pre-Christian times) is to be wary of marrying charisma to power. Charisma is lovely, but organizations that use it for basic fuel can become less functional when the charismatic leader departs. Our Lord, interestingly, was regularly given to preparing his disciples for a time when he would not be around in the same way. It’s an important lesson for the vitality of any organization.

3. The recurring meme about powerful opponents in the Curia is one of those everlasting but partial realities. The idea that the Curia not only helps but hinders (of course at the same time) a pope has been a constant for centuries. The particular version of this idea nascent here and elsewhere creates the impression that there are many in power near the Pope who actively oppose his entire agenda – whereas the reality is likely less melodramatic. There are disagreements. There is bureaucratic inertia – both internally and externally motivated. There are different agendas. Curial officials have a habit of speaking like they have the Pope’s ear in a special way, and many popes (like many good leaders) have a habit of allowing different curial officials to infer he agrees with them, et cet.

I read some of the criticisms of the Holy Father, and it struck me that I am glad that he has time to think, pray and meditate. I would not trust a man who was more worried about what other people are saying than about what God is speaking to his heart.

I believe that there are certain charisms that are given to Our Papa by God as part of His office, it does take faith in God to trust in that. Perhaps what B 16’s critics lack is faith in God to act through this man, and through the personality and gifts that God has given to Him.

I once read a study which said that approximately 75% of us are extroverts. That leaves 25% of us as “introverts” or quiet types, who like a bit of “alone time” once in a while. Apart from the very valid point Liam makes that Benedict XVI is going against his predecessor’s cult of personality, he’s also by nature a quiet person, who probably does like a meal alone after a morning spent holding audiences. He strikes me as someone who might fit the monastic type of personality and this is by no means a criticism. On the contrary, it’s one of the things I appreciate most about him. It’s no surprise that the MSM would find this strange and inexplicable.

Well, there are two meanings of intro/extroversion. The more conventional has to do with reserve, shyness and sociability. The more technical has to do with where people get their energy from – from within oneself or from stimulation outside oneself (other people, most notably). I think our current Pope may be an introvert in that technical sense more than the conventional sense. I would not think him shy or uncomfortable with sustaining sociability – though his manner would probably strike many Americans (except perhaps old-time New Englanders) as reserved

When you shop…

... through Amazon, please, come here first? Enter Amazon through my search box. I'll then get a small percentage of everything you buy. (Pssst - Can't see the search box? Turn off your "ad-blocker" for this site!)

My wish lists

The horse is made ready for the day of battle, but the victory belongs to the LORD.

- Proverbs 21:31

Support them with prayer and fasting.

CLICK to buy Car Magnets & Stickers

Aedificantium enim unusquisque gladio erat accinctus.

- Nehemiah 4:18

"Let God arise! Let His enemies be scattered! Let those who hate him flee before His Holy Face!"

CLICK and say your Daily Offering!

Let us pray…

Grant unto thy Church, we beseech
Thee, O merciful God, that She, being
gathered together by the Holy Ghost, may
be in no wise troubled by attack from her
foes.
O God, who by sin art offended and by
penance pacified, mercifully regard the
prayers of Thy people making supplication
unto Thee,and turn away the scourges of
Thine anger which we deserve for our sins.
Almighty and Everlasting God, in
whose Hand are the power and the
government of every realm: look down upon
and help the Christian people that the heathen
nations who trust in the fierceness of their
own might may be crushed by the power of
thine Arm. Through our Lord Jesus Christ,
Thy Son, who liveth and reigneth with Thee
in the unity of the Holy Ghost, God, world
without end. R. Amen.

An outstanding opportunity to get into Latin and New Testament Greek

For Easter: another ethereal music CD from the chart-topping nuns…

Yes, Fr. Z is taking ads…

... and there will be nearly 1,000,000 page loads this month.

A bit more food for thought…

“Only one sin is nowadays severely punished: the attentive observance of the traditions of our Fathers. For that reason the good ones are thrown out of their places and brought to the desert.”

- Basil of Caesarea - ep. 243

Help Monks in Wyoming, Fr. Z, and get great coffee too!

And they have tea too!

Food For Thought

“The legalization of the termination of pregnancy is none other than the authorization given to an adult, with the approval of an established law, to take the lives of children yet unborn and thus incapable of defending themselves. It is difficult to imagine a more unjust situation, and it is very difficult to speak of obsession in a matter such as this, where we are dealing with a fundamental imperative of every good conscience — the defense of the right to life of an innocent and defenseless human being.”

- St. John Paul II

PLEASE RESPOND. Pretty pleeeease?

Should the US Bishops have us return to obligatory "meatless Fridays" during the whole year and not just during Lent?

Because you don’t know when you are going to need to move fast or get along without the supermarket…

For your consideration…

"One of the most dangerous errors is that civilization is automatically bound to increase and spread. The lesson of history is the opposite; civilization is a rarity, attained with difficulty and easily lost. The normal state of humanity is barbarism, just as the normal surface of the planet is salt water. Land looms large in our imagination and civilization in history books, only because sea and savagery are to us less interesting."

- C.S. Lewis

Identity theft is a serious problem that you do NOT want to have. I use Lifelock.

And for your cybersecurity…

Wyoming Catholic College!

A great place in Rome…

More food for thought:

“I expect to die in bed, my successor will die in prison and his successor will die a martyr in the public square. His successor will pick up the shards of a ruined society and slowly help rebuild civilization, as the church has done so often in human history.”

Check out the Cardinal Newman Society feed!

Be a “Zed-Head”!

Fr. Z’s stuff is everywhere

More food for thought…

"All laws which are repugnant to the Constitution are null and void."

- Marbury v. Madison, 5 U.S. 137, 176

Even More Food For Thought

"Men by their constitutions are naturally divided into two parties:
1. Those who fear and distrust the people, and wish to draw all powers from them into the hands of the higher classes.
2. Those who identify themselves with the people, have confidence in them, cherish and consider them as the most honest and safe, although not the most wise depositary of the public interests."

Additional Food For Thought

“And how we burned in the camps later, thinking: What would things have been like if every Security operative, when he went out at night to make an arrest, had been uncertain whether he would return alive and had to say good-bye to his family? Or if, during periods of mass arrests, as for example in Leningrad, when they arrested a quarter of the entire city, people had not simply sat there in their lairs, paling with terror at every bang of the downstairs door and at every step on the staircase, but had understood they had nothing left to lose and had boldly set up in the downstairs hall an ambush of half a dozen people with axes, hammers, pokers, or whatever else was at hand?... The Organs would very quickly have suffered a shortage of officers and transport and, notwithstanding all of Stalin's thirst, the cursed machine would have ground to a halt! If...if...We didn't love freedom enough. And even more – we had no awareness of the real situation.... We purely and simply deserved everything that happened afterward.”

- Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

Fathers, you don’t know who might show up! It could be a “big fish” of one sort or other…

And... GO TO CONFESSION!

Leave Voice Mail for Fr. Z

Nota bene: I do not answer these numbers or this Skype address. You won't get me "live". I check for messages regularly.

Help the Sisters. They have a building project. Get great soap (gifts, etc.) while helping REAL nuns!

Food For Thought

“Men are qualified for civil liberty in exact proportion to their disposition to put moral chains upon their own appetites. . . . Society cannot exist unless a controlling power upon will and appetite be placed somewhere; and the less of it there is within, the more there must be without. It is ordained in the eternal constitution of things, that men of intemperate minds cannot be free. Their passions forge their fetters.”

Archives

ENTRY CALENDAR

Do you use my blog often? Is it helpful to you?

If so, please consider subscribing to send a monthly donation. That way I have steady income I can plan on, and you wind up regularly on my list of benefactors for whom I pray and for whom I periodically say Holy Mass.

Some options

The opinions expressed on this blog do not necessarily reflect the positions of any of the Church's entities with which I am involved. They are my own.